Burnham-on-Crouch U3A

March 2015

SPRING

By Gerard Manley Hopkins

Nothing is so beautiful as Spring – When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; Thrushes’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush, Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring The ear, it strikes the lightning to hear him sing; The glassy pear tree leaves and blooms, they brush The descending blue; that blue is all in a rush With richness; the racing lambs too have fair their fling.

What is all this juice and all this joy? A strain of the earth’s sweet being in the beginning In Eden garden – Have, get, before it cloy, Before it cloud, Christ, lord, and sour with sinning, Innocent mind and Mayday in girl and boy, Most, O maid’s child, thy choice and worthy the winning.